Today, I read an article where a person shared their experience of binge eating 8,000 calories after fasting for 7 days.
The person described severe symptoms, and while the experience involved something called "refeed syndrome," I could relate to many of the struggles they shared.
Binge eating can be incredibly dangerous if left unchecked or untreated.
I’ve been down a similar path myself, caught in old diet culture habits.
At one point, I went 6 days without eating anything—not even drinking water. After that, I literally forgot how to chew. I’m not exaggerating. I lost 5-6 kg by doing extreme and unhealthy things, I was young and careless. This was called a "healing fast," and while it may have been based on some truth, it certainly wasn’t healthy for me.
I also tried eating only 5 apples a day for 5 days. While I did lose weight, the memory of it still haunts me. Eventually, I realized something was deeply wrong when I found myself constantly bingeing. Years of therapy helped, but recovery wasn’t perfect in the beginning.
This is the third post in a series where I explore my journey through eating disorder recovery. You can read my earlier posts here: 3 Reasons Diet Culture Makes Us Feel Hopeless and How to Regulate Your Emotions (Day 1).
I hope this post helps you recognize some of the things I got wrong and provides some insight for your own journey.
1. Avoiding Diets but Still Bingeing and Thinking It's Okay
After years of depriving myself, I started telling myself that I could eat anything I wanted—something my therapist emphasized a lot, but I adapted that mindset to my binge eating habits.
I had so many things to deal with: my family, my relationship, friendships that were on shaky ground, my ADHD, and a job that didn’t make me happy.
Not to mention, I kept reliving my past traumas over and over again.
So, I completely stepped away from diet culture for a while. This was a period when my binge eating really peaked.
I used to diet all the time and after not dieting these new bouts of guilty eating affected me more mentally and physically.
During that time, I was also on Instagram, where an eating disorder coach talked about this. She told me,
Yes, you're no longer dieting, but you're still covering up your problems and not confronting them.
That’s when I realized that telling myself to "eat whatever you want" wasn’t helping, it was making things harder for me. So a perfectionist mindset or unhealthy thoughts about my body were still there.
2. Mistakenly Forcing Myself to Eat More in the First Meal with Intermittent Fasting
I used to force myself to eat more at my first meal, thinking it would prevent bingeing later.
While it's important to eat enough, overeating to the point of making yourself nauseous can backfire, especially with healthy foods.
I was not learning to listen to my body and I was forcing myself to eat two meals and overeat at those meals.
I was trying intermittent fasting as one of my many approaches, but it often left me feeling sick, feeling hungry and thinking about food, and eventually led to more bingeing.
Yeah, it wasn’t about the amount of food I was eating; it was about my mindset.
Forcing yourself into anything, especially with food, will never lead to a healthy relationship with eating.
3. Eating Healthy While Secretly Stashing Snacks
This was another issue I faced with trying to eat "healthy."
I would force myself to eat things like broccoli, even though I knew I should be eating a balanced diet in normal amounts.
I’d go through phases of eating only what I considered healthy, but then I’d forbid myself from eating too much of it.
This led to sneaky behavior, like going to the supermarket and buying junk food with the thought,
You can eat whenever you want; you won’t eat all of it.
Stockpiling food at home, especially when I didn’t trust myself, only made things worse.
The constant noise of food was all over my home and in my brain.
If you don’t trust yourself, it’s hard to stock food and expect to eat it responsibly whenever you want.
I still try to be intuitive when buying food for my home.
4. Thinking Forceful Motivation Like "You Have To" Would Help
Looking back, I realize I often thought forceful motivation, telling myself "you have to"—would help.
Even now, when I experience emotional eating, I sometimes catch myself thinking, "Oh, I shouldn’t even be talking about recovery."
But the truth is, I don’t have to be perfect all the time. Sometimes, eating more is okay, as long as I’m not avoiding my problems.
It’s easy to fall into the trap of creating rules for yourself:
- You have to stop buying certain foods.
- You have to stop watching movies while you eat.
- You have to lose weight.
Even though I’ve moved away from the typical diet mindset, there are still remnants of diet culture in my thinking.
I used to constantly measure myself, obsessing over weight gain and feeling like I had to force myself into unhealthy mental patterns.
But forcing yourself into these "you have to" rules never brings real change, it just adds more pressure and guilt.
5. Obsessively Checking My Weight Every Day
Yes, I used to weigh myself every morning—without clothes, without eating anything, just like many dietitians recommend. I would track every single gram, writing down the changes obsessively.
But over time, I realized that this habit was making my binge eating worse.
When I didn’t like the number on the scale, it would trigger a binge.
If the number was "too big" according to the standards I set for myself, I’d end up in a cycle of self-loathing and bingeing again.
I threw out my first scale when I decided to make a healthy change. But months later, I found another one in my home. I hesitated:
- Should I use it?
- Will it make me happy or sad?
- What will I feel if the number is big?
- Am I happy with how I look right now, and what will change after weighing myself?
After talking to my boyfriend and some helpful users on Reddit, I made the decision not to step on the scale.
I knew it would only make me hate myself more because, deep down, I still didn’t believe it was a healthy way to measure my progress.
You should weigh yourself when you truly need to, like when your doctor requires it. And you probably already know how your body feels, especially if you’ve been dieting for much of your life.
Talk to your doctor, therapist or personal trainer, make a plan for exercise with them, and reach out to your loved ones for support.
This journey is complex and long, but I will continue to share my story. Thanks for reading!
